A historically significant Jamaican tortoiseshell and silver mounted set of combs and case, dated 1688, believed to be one of the earliest surviving works of art made in Jamaica of European influence will be sold in a sale of Fine Furniture and Works of Art sale at Bonhams in Edinburgh on Wednesday 7th June 2006.

This 350 year old comb and case is decorated with the arms of Jamaica, and inscribed ‘Port Royal Jamaica 1688’ and the Jamaican motto ‘From many, one people’. The reverse is decorated with indigenous trees and fruits. There are few known examples of this type of comb, and just one other silver-mounted comb case of this type is documented. It is in the collection of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts.

Tortoiseshell objets d’art were made in Jamaica in the late 17th Century, in Spanish Town and Port Royal, prior to the Great Earthquake of 1692. Highly prized for its colour, translucency and brilliant shine, tortoiseshell was used for furniture inlays and luxurious accessories in the 17th century.

The comb and set is estimated to fetch £1500-2000.

Port Royal in Jamaica
In 1494 Christopher Columbus was the first European to discover Jamaica whilst exploring the Caribbean, mistakenly thinking he had finally discovered the Far East. He was so convinced, in fact, that he forced his men to take a solemn oath that the land mass was a promontory of Asia. Despite this, Jamaica was never heavily populated by the Spanish, partly due to the absence of gold on the island. Instead it was used as a base for their conquest of the Americas. Great wealth was brought to the island by the buccaneers, who operated mainly from Port Royal, by plundering Spanish ships which transported gold and silver from South America

In 1655 the British Admirals Penn and Venables captured Jamaica and effectively ousted the Spanish. The British used the island to their full advantage, importing African slaves by the thousand to work on the sugar plantations, while the plantation owners became enormously wealthy. The island prospered under the rule of the British. By the late 17th Century, Port Royal had earned the reputation of being the richest and the wickedest city in the world. In 1692 this town suffered destruction by an earthquake in which more than half of the town sank beneath the sea. This signaled the end of piracy in the West Indies

For more details visit the Bonhams web site.